I've been asked if I have any 60s and 70s pics. Well there are quite a few, but it'll take too long to load them all in one go, so they'll come in dribs and drabs as I get time.

So first one is a picture from 1966. Snowy Mcalister was taking the Duke's boart to the Coolangata Aussie titles.
On the way he stopped off at Crescent heads, and asked us boys to get a photo with him.

I'm on the left, then Neil Pegler, Snowy, Murray Smith and Boz Cummings.

Jump forward to the Aussie titles at Margarets, 1969? I think

Would you believe they stopped the heat while he grabbed another board?

No idea when this was, no meta data in those days, but probably about the same time. Also don't know who the rider is


And now I guess it's time for one of me.

I think this is at Indijup Pt.
I remember this board well, I loved it. This was when we were transiting from 9' to 6' boards. It wasn't quite half way at 8'. But so much lighter than the old traditional mals it was easy to throw around, and quick to accelerate, could also nose ride it, didn't have a lot of nose rocker. So I think around early 1969 or late 1968. At the time "trackers" were coming into fashion. I remember being told, that if we shouldn't be riding these boards, we should be riding the "latest thing". But we didn't do fashion, we tried to do appropriate, and the board above was a great all-rounder, whereas trackers were developed for long fast breaking waves like Kirra. They were OK for Scarborough and Triggs. But not so good where you needed manoeuvrability.

Before I finish for the day, I feel the need for colour.





This a crew of Southern Surfriders. The track to the Pt was boggy, so we loaded all the boards on my wagon. Then the I drove fairly sedately, and the guys followed behind to push when the need arose. You may be able to pick a young future champ in the pic?

Far out thats epic mate! Youve come up with the goods for sure.
thanks for posting keen to see more when you get a chance

Thanks mate, well here's some more.
This my mate Boz and George Greenough at Noosa. I think this was probably at Nationals.


!966 for sure, that's when we were there. This was the start of the short board revolution. Greenough on his spoon demonstrated, how much more speed and acceleration you could get with a shorter lighter more manoeuvrable board, Bob McTavish and Nat young drove the initial changes, although some of Nat's ideas were very weird.
I experimented with flexible tails and fins, looking for stored energy release. It certainly worked, but the boards weren't neutral handling, especially in the soup.

Here's another of my old mates, Arty Sherburn, not sure when or where, but could be Maragret River Mouth.



And here's another or Arty, this time at Isolated Cottesloe


And to stay in the area, The Cove, in the early days when I was still learning.


And here's the flexi tail and fin I was talking about.


Early 1967, getting inspired by the spoon. from memory this was the 3rd board I made. I called it "suicide". It had almost 0 rocker, and when you wiped out, invariably it would nose dive, be driven deep by the wave, then come flying out the back, just as you surfaced. I soon learnt to stay under until I heard the slap as it landed. Looking at that now, I see my foiling skills were at a very elementary level!

Early 60s at Margarets, these two are from the rival South side club, they had a shack at Preverly Park next to ours.
Probably 64/5


After watching this wave we paddled out.

Keen to see more - particularly the early metro breaks. That one of the Cove is a cracker!

Got any of Trigg Point?

Not sure, I'll have a search. I did have a movie, but lost that in a fire.
edit, had a quick look and there is non in this computer, but there are heaps of slides and photos that haven't been digitised. Unfortunately I don't have time for that right now, maybe one rainy day, when I've nothing else to do I'll go through them.
In the process of looking I've found a few more that are probably worth posting. I'll do that later.

That last pic of the left at margs is a cracker! love the others tooKeen to see more,,,,especially rotto and mandurah area if yoy have any.
this is absolute surfing WA historical gold mate

OK, if you want historical I'll start here, 1956, looks like Yalingup. Ray Geary, with a quiver of cigar boxes.
Ray had a shack, just over the back of the sandhill in front of what is now called Gearies, which is short for Geary's Shack.

And staying around what's now Falcon, here's where I did some of my learning, then Miami bay, now Falcon Bay.


This is me on a mates cigar box, we'd swapped boards. I had my solid balsa 9' mal the old man and I made. state of the art back then, the average board was still hollow plywood.

I was only 16 at the time and relied on the oldies to drive me from Yokine to the beach, so didn't get a lot of surfing in.
This all changed once I got a car.




First car, first board. We got the design for this board from a library book about surfing. The blank was sold by Boans, 9' long 4" thick. rocker was in 3 flat sections. no progressive change, straight from one flat plain to another.
I soon learnt this wasn't ideal, and bought my next urethane blank from Plastics limited a few years later.

Big jump again, while I'm in this folder. a couple more classic Margarets pics.




Moving further North, classic Rocky Pt.


And I just have to finish off, with a couple of me at Surf beach, aka, The 27, Anstey, and now Secret Harbour


This looks a lot like "suicide" I don't see any rocker.


This could be one of the 3 boards I didn't make, a Gordon Woods Nat Young sold me while we stayed at Crescent Heads in 66

Sorry no pics of Rottnest, I only surfed transits once. The other times I went over with a board it was flat all around the Island.

So much gold there mate. Love the surf beach one. Wondering when it was first surfed - that looks mid -1960s ish? So maybe around then?
must have been a mission to get to back then, was still a bit of a mission in the 80s when I first started surfing it.

Always wondered where gearies got its name. Actually was listening to The west peak surf podcast the other day, and the surfer being interviewed mentioned surfing with his mate Ray Gearie back in the day, so I wondered if that's where it was from - now I know it is

thanks again for putting these up

Ps. All the pics of beautiful left hand main break walls have me wondering why the WSL seems to think it's only a right ?

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Ctngoodvibes said..
Ps. All the pics of beautiful left hand main break walls have me wondering why the WSL seems to think it's only a right ?

Back in the early 60s we only went left, probably because it was a bit safer, the channel back out didn't close out.
Also there was no duck diving or leg ropes. It wasn't until the mid or later 60s, when boards were faster and riders more confident, they started to go right.

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Love the surf beach one. Wondering when it was first surfed - that looks mid -1960s ish? So maybe around then?

Originally it was "the 27" because the turn off was near the 27 mile peg from Freo. I remember trying to get there in the old mans' wagon, scatched the side to blazes on the bushes, and got into big trouble. So that would have been late 62 or early 63.

Thank you so much for putting up these photos. This would have to be the best thread ever on seabreeze

So you've got me reminiscing, and going through old albums and pic envelopes.
This one surprised me, I don't remember where it came from. It my Mates' Bos old mans oldsmobile, renamed the bosmobile. From left to right, that's me, Merv Nabs, Dave Ellis and Rick Hayes. The puzzle is, where was it taken? Could it be the Miami Bay shop? Clearest memory of this car and crew, was going past Gearies on the way to Avalon. As we passed the gap through sandhill, there was a beautiful set pouring through. about 3 or 4 waves breaking in a perfect peel off. Bos slammed the anchors on. The board rack clamps gave way, and the hole lot slid off onto the road. Don't think I've seen gearies break like that since.
So just off to the left of my shoulder there's some blurry writing, can you make out "MIAMI" at the extreme left?

I think this next one is at surf beach, it looks like my West Coast Surf Boards partner Bob Gardiner. But I don't remember him turning quite like that.
The fin isn't doing very much, board is being held in by the rail.

This next, may have been from a surfbeach comp, as there are a few southern surfriders sitting together. But what got my attention is the two West Coast Surfboard stickers on the bottom of that board. A mate of my sun was trying to trace the details of an old West Coast Surboard. I wasn't sure of it's date or if I had shaped it. But these two stickers, that are the same as the board in question, puts it in the period I was shaping, late 68 early 69, when the boards are still around 7'

The only person I'm sure of is Arty Sherburn facing the camera.

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Nathe said..
Thank you so much for putting up these photos. This would have to be the best thread ever on seabreeze

agree!

Thanks guys, I don't think there'll be much more, there's lots of other pics, but the quality isn't there and I think it would just get boring.

Hey decrepit - thanks again for sharing. Those boards in the last post look like a Peter Clarke stringer-less pintail circa 1967. The reason I kinda know is that I found one in a skip-bin walking the dog a few years back. It was rough and had some significant damage, but I liked the unique outline- being right between the traditional long boards and the more modern short boards of the 70's. According to my research they were only made between May and Sept in 1967. Mine is 7'6".

I was originally going to get it back in the water, but then I had a major shoulder recon and gained some weight so that was not realistic, so I did it up as a wall hanger. I know people will scream I should have left the original patina, but it was split and delaminated and dark water marks all over it... not forgetting I fished it out of the bin. Anyway, she now has a new life as a wall hanger in the games room...

What a interesting read not a surfer, bit of Longboarding sometimes. Talk about nostalgia & old pics,love it.someone mention Triggs, l would love to see an old photo of a big day at the point, around the 1960s . I believe they blew the reef up just after that.

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gavnwend said..
What a interesting read not a surfer, bit of Longboarding sometimes. Talk about nostalgia & old pics,love it.someone mention Triggs, l would love to see an old photo of a big day at the point, around the 1960s . I believe they blew the reef up just after that.

Ledgerary Steve hog hannett.trigg point.1975.

^^^
Great photo!

I was out there when Cheyne Horan (world #2 at the time) came over to WA to surf the big swell in Oct or Nov 1983... (I remember as I was meant to be studying for yr12 TAE exams). It was bigger than that photo and peeling off the point beautifully. Only seen it like that one other time in the 40yrs since... and they had a comp on that day.

Now it gets nowhere near as good... and anytime there's a sniff of shape/size it's a bajillion times as crowded.

I remember when wave ski use to sit out the back & steal your wave.the 80s were good at the point, foamies & a rash for a week.lol

Great stuff, guys, keep it coming.

Ripper pics Decrepit.

Just found this thread great pics Decrepit really enjoyed the stories hope you are well Cheers

Here are some pics of a 1964 Hawkes 9'8" longboard. Made in Osborne Park WA. Purchased off GumTree for a steal as the seller was moving home and this has been sitting under the house for 20+ years, and he had no idea what it was worth. Thankfully there was a thick layer of wax protecting it - so all I had to do was give it a light rub back and gloss spray it. This one is also hanging in the games room.

Great find GPA a lot of WA shapers started at Hawke Brothers

This is where I risk getting boring, but overnight thought of another story, so here goes.

This is Peter Stevens at the Gallows. From memory there was just the two of us, we took it in turn to take pics.
At that time it was a long walk, about 500m, the road ended up at a farm house. and it was a trek from there with the old heavy mals.
One of the older crew, bulldozed a track through the farmers property so we could drive to the beach. This made it easy but increased the number in the water, but not by much, the track was very rough, bumpy and windy, where the bulldozer had wound round the bigger trees. That was another movie section that went to the fire.

I had a wipeout, somewhere, maybe Meelup on a big storm swell? the board was upside down and facing the shore.
I was body surfing towards it in the foam.
Tried to get my hand round the front of the fin, but just as I reached the board, the wave lifted the board, Instead of my hand going round the front of the fin, it went straight into the sharp trailing edge. Big cut at the base of my thumb, blood going everywhere. The guys drove me to Busselton, where a Doctor was sewing me back together. Of course he asked me how I did it. As soon as I started explaining, he said. "YOU ARE ONE OF THOSE @#%$%@ SURFERS THAT PUT A BULLDOZER THROUGH MY LAND".. No no not me sir I replied!

Just had a reply from Bos, he confirms that he took the pic of us and the bosmobile in front of the Miami shop.
It doesn't look anything like that now. It's become a very successful coffee shop.

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^^^^

I am enjoying the tales of waves past... and will read as many as you can be bothered to put up!

Cheers, GPA

Just had an email from Barry young, with pics I haven't see before. Which is very puzzling, because I can't figure out why I appear to be missing from the pic at the Coolangatta hotel. around the time of the 1966 Aussie titles.


so Murray Smith is here, Barry Young, Arty Sherburn, Neil Peggler John Staley, Michael Bibby, Bos Cummins , Johnny Bulgarnie, Peter Willie, and a couple of females, Possible Tina Christenson from the Miami Shop in front.

There's two heads hiding, one of which may be me.

According to Barry, this is Midget in 1968.
This is what he says.
"The shot of Midget at 1968 State Titles with the first Pintails any of us had seen or heard about. He was mocked a bit for having a point on both ends of a board !! Peter Bothwell won the Opens with me second and Arty Third. Big crowd there because of Midget. "


So I guess that's the WA titles, and why didn't Midget get in the top 3?

This must be a SA trick when there's no surf.



So if anybody can tell me where I was when the Collangatta hotel pic was taken, I'd be very grateful!

Bos, had the answer, I took the pic, so I'm not in the frame. I must have lost the original print somewhere along the line, because I just found it's negative..
Thanks Bos!

Great photos , ya been surfing for a few years now. Cool that ya still get out there . Keep it up.